


More than Nothing

by Tabithian



Series: Through the Looking Glass [1]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, Background Relationships, Crack, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-13
Updated: 2015-07-13
Packaged: 2018-04-09 03:36:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,976
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4332333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabithian/pseuds/Tabithian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Like a lot of things in Jason's life, this makes no fucking sense.</p>
            </blockquote>





	More than Nothing

**Author's Note:**

> College AU based off [this](http://tabithian.tumblr.com/post/123967650314/some-more-aus) because I am weak to AUs.

Like a lot of things in Jason's life, this makes no fucking sense.

“Dick - “

“No, but listen,” Dick says, digging through his closet for who even knows. “This is. Roy's having a crisis, and he needs me to do this for him.”

Jason.

“Dick.”

Apparently Dick finds whatever he's looking for because he makes a noise of triumph and whirls around with - 

“What the fuck is that.”

“Do you like it?” Dick's asking, holding the abomination in front of him, giving it a little shake. “It was part of my costume for a presentation last year.”

Jason's going to go ahead and assume that presentation was all about gay pirates.

“I know, right?” Dick says. “It's great.”

It's something.

“Oh, and here,” Dick says, and hold out a pair of tiny finger cymbals. (Yes, Jason knows the whole point of finger cymbals is to be tiny, but whatever.)

“What.”

“You're my backup,” Dick says, as though Jason should already know that. 

As if all serenaders need backup, in case of what? Some kind of rival serenader showing up? Maybe a serenader rumble going down, last one standing wins? 

Jesus Christ.

“We don't have a lot of time,” Dick says, pushing at Jason. “We need to practice!”

********

Because Dick's BFF is dying of the plague or some shit and unable to serenade his lady love to win back her favor, Dick's going to do it for him.

“What the hell is wrong with you?”

“He's my best friend, Jason,” Dick says, preening in the mirror. “It's my duty to help him in his time of need.”

********

Jason kind of wants to die. 

Or, no. 

Kill Dick? Yeah, that sounds about right.

“Are you sure this is the place?”

Dick sets up, single-minded as he tunes the guitar (Jason didn't know he could play), flowy sleeves fluttering in the early evening breeze.

Jason looks down at the tiny finger cymbals and shrugs, what the hell, it's not like this is the weirdest thing Dick's gotten him to do since the university assigned them as roommates. (It's really not.)

When Dick's done tuning up, Jason gives him a flat look and hits the finger cymbals together, like _Good job!, Well done, A+!_

Dick snorts, turns to look back up at the dorm window two stories up. Starts throwing rocks at it and yelling their intended victim's name until someone opens the window. Jason sure as hell hopes it's her because there's too much light behind whoever it is to tell for sure.

And then Dick starts singing, some 80's power ballad and because they had all of two hours to practice and Jason's an asshole, Jason brings the finger cymbals together randomly.

Dick shoot his this look, this _Can you not?_ kind of look, and Jason. Jason grins a little toothily and starts hitting the finger cymbals together every few seconds to no discernible pattern.

That gets him a scowl, but Dick's busy being in a stand-in serenader and can't do much to complain.

Dick's just getting to the end of the song when there's a string of curses from above them, and then there's screaming and swearing and Jason lunging for Dick's throat. (Some asshole's throwing fucking ice water down on them and it's goddamn October, you bet your fucking ass Jason's going for the cause of at least ninety percent of his suffering before he freezes to death.)

Dick, though, is some kind of fucking gymnast (since he was a kid, and he might have made it to the Olympics if he hadn't fucked up his knees along the way) and does fancy flips to escape and Jason.

Jason looks up to see the light level in the dorm Dick was serenading are down to normal range because he can see some kind of midget troll leaning out the dorm window, dripping bucket in his hands.

“Leave!” the troll shouts, “Or I'll call campus security!”

Oh, no, not them. Whatever will they do? 

Jason opens his mouth to say something, and there's some kind of scuffle going on up there, midget troll being pulled back and replaced with some other asshole.

“Sorry about him, he doesn't get out that much,” the new asshole yells down, and then Jason's got a goddamn towel in his face.

“The fuck?”

“...crap,” filters down, followed with a contrite, “sorry!”

Jason sighs, plucks the towel off his face and looks over to see a towel draped over a stunned Dick.

“This is why I hate you,” Jason says. “This. Exactly this.”

********

Towel guy runs downstairs in what has to be some kind of record bringing yet even more towels with him. 

“I'm _so_ sorry about that,” the guy says, gesturing at Jason's face, which.

The fuck.

“I wasn't trying to hit your face.”

Oh. Right. _That_. 

Jason shakes his head, starts to tell the guy it's no big problem, but then there's Dick crowding him, leaning towards the guy.

“I know you.”

Jason would like to say he's surprised by that, but not really, because Dick knows everyone.

“Er.”

“You work for the school paper, right?”

And that's when Jason notices the guy has a camera with him, tucked under his arm.

“Yeah,” the guy says, looks a little embarrassed. “Yeah.”

There's some staring going on, now. 

Dick staring at towel guy like Jason doesn't even want to know, and towel guy staring at Dick like he thinks Dick might well be certifiable. (He is.)

Jason rolls his eyes, uses the towel the guy dropped on his face to get the worst of the water off.

“Sorry, again,” the guy says. “My roommate's a little grumpy.”

Jason.

“Also, Jade's dorm is over there,” the guy says, and points to a window that was definitely not the one Dick was just serenading. “...and she's out of town for a martial arts tournament.”

“Oops.”

Jason is going to fucking kill Dick. 

********

“Okay, so,” Dick says, and then just sort of trails off.

Jason waits. 

“I.”

Jason waits some more.

“But really.”

And some more.

“Huh.”

There would be more waiting, but, well. 

“I'm going to kill you.”

Dick is really fucking fast, but Jason is really fucking relentless, so it evens out in the end..

********

Dick has apparently kidnapped Towel Guy.

“What the fuck.”

Towel Guy is sitting in the middle of their dorm room tied to Jason's computer chair.

There's some muffled talking on the guy's part, an aborted shrug and then.

“Okay, so, Kory doesn't know what happened to her handcuffs,” Dick says, walking in. “She - “

Jason, because he's been roommates with Dick for what feels like forever but is really only two years, asks the only thing he can, if he wants to hold on to the last shreds of his sanity.

“Do I want to know?” 

Dick, the asshole, actually looks like he's thinking about it

********

“Hey, sorry again,” Towel Guy says, dropping his lunch tray down across from Jason. “Dick was just helping me with a class project.”

Jason looks at Towel Guy.

Not bad looking, a little on the thin side of things, super attractive shadows under his eyes from perpetual lack of sleep, dark hair and blue eyes and and the kind of pale skin that means computers, probably, or maybe secret mole person.

“Camera actually,” Towel Guy says with a little smile. “Also, you're one to talk about sleep deprivation.”

Jason frowns.

“My internal dialogue is where it's supposed to be,” Towel Guy says, and laughs when Jason realizes he'd said all of that out loud.

Fuck.

********

Towel Guy is fucking pretentious.

“Photographers are prisoners of their own limitations,” Dick recites dutifully, and then goes, “ _somethingsomethingsomething_.”

“What?”

“They wouldn't accept my initial propossal,” Towel Guy says, eyeing the chains around his ankles critically.

“Which was?”

There's a significant pause, Towel Guy and Dick exchanging a look, and, “Kittens.”

********

Okay, so maybe not so much kittens as goddamn lions.

“And tigers, and bears, oh my,” Dick says, because he's a goddamn asshole.

“Grayson, if you don't cease your babbling, I'll feed you to them.”

Midget Troll is every bit as charming and pleasant as ever, only this time he's got some big fucking cats and a mangy looking bear eating out of his palm.

Literally.

“Great bedside manner,” Jason says, wonders why the hell Towel Guy's professor had said no to all this. 

Midget Troll bares his teeth, but considering he's wearing an over-sized lab coat, it loses something.

Dick looks at Midget Troll with what might as well be hearts in his eyes, and oh, God, Jason's the third fucking wheel on this bizarre date.

********

“Yeah,” Towel Guy says, something like fondness in his voice. “Damian wants to be a zoo vet, so.”

Jason has no idea what's going on right now, just that Towel Guy is talking to him without throwing things in his face or being tied up by Dick in some way. 

“I'm going to be honest here,” Jason says. “I have no fucking clue what's going on right now.”

Because Midget Troll is over by the arcade games, arms crossed over his chest and truly frightening glare on his face watching Dick try for high score on some stupid game. Towel Guy is sitting across from Jason, nervously picking at the label on his beer and making awkward small talk and - 

“Um.”

Towel Guy is looking anywhere but at Jason, hands suddenly so, so still.

Jason squints at him.

“I can explain?”

Jason considers it. Tilts his head one way, then the other.

“Eh,” he says. “It's not like you're hideously ugly.”

Towel Guy blinks.

Shakes his head and gives Jason a slow once-over. “You're not completely unattractive,” he says, little smile peeking through at the end.

This is what confessions of love are _not_ made of, probably.

“Is this because that asshole serenaded you?”

By mistake, because Dick transposed the last two numbers of the address, and instead of getting Roy's lady love, they'd gotten Midget Troll and Towel Guy, and holy crap, that sounds like one of Dick's shitty detective shows from the 70s, maybe into the early 80s as well.

“Well,” Towel Guy says, shoulders dropping just the tiniest bit. “It was pretty romantic.”

The hell it was.

Dick was off-key and Jason was being an asshole with the damn finger cymbals and they hadn't even gotten the right fucking dorm window.

“It's the thought that counts?”

Jason's just going to let Towel Guy have this one.

“Thanks,” Towel Guy says, rolling his eyes. And also, “My name is Tim, by the way.”

********

It's probably a good thing to know your boyfriend's name.

********

“I need you to tie me up,” Tim says, and shoves some rope into Jason's hands. 

It's not even his birthday.

“For my class project, jerk,” Tim says, and there's a laugh in his voice. “Dick's. Er.”

Busy. 

Probably with Kory's new handcuffs and the Midget Troll and Jason never ever wants to think about that ever again.

“Ew,” Tim says, looking a little green. “Okay, we really need to work on you keeping your internal monologue somewhere it won't give me nightmares.”

********

Like a lot of things in Jason's life, this makes no fucking sense.

“Really, though,” Tim says, jabbing Jason with an bony, bony elbow. “That's not how science works.”

It's a summer blockbuster, Jason's pretty sure the whole point is to give a big old _fuck you_ to science and anything resembling common sense or logic.

“Shut up.”

Jason sighs, greatly put upon because Tim is leaning against him and bitching about scientific inaccuracies in a movie in which the heroes are trying to do...something, probably.

Jason's not really paying attention to it anymore.

A little more focused on not losing a damn eye when Tim flails over some new wrong being perpetuated onscreen.

“That's not even a thing that science does!”

**Author's Note:**

> *hands*


End file.
